surveys

LIBRARY EDITION PDF £50

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We have available a 145 page pdf for library use that includes:
Bookmarks to each section with
Links to each page with
External links to relevant websites about young people's health and wellbeing
There is also the facility to print the black and white publication.

This report, Young People into 2013, is a "unique contemporary archive" of young people from the Schools Health Education Unit (SHEU). Each year, since 1977, SHEU carry out healthy lifestyle surveys with young people and, in 2012, this involved over 93,000 youngsters. This report contains over 100 health-related behaviour questions and answers from over 68,000 pupils between the ages of 10 and 15. They tell us about what they do at home, at school, and with their friends. The data have been collected from primary and secondary schools across the United Kingdom. The report is the 27th in the series.

Dr David Regis, Research Manager of the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
"Angels or Demons? When I first started working in the Unit in 1986, I saw two headlines about the first report. One declared, "Teenagers take homework and alcohol in moderation", while the other – looking at the same figures – summed it up as "Layabout lifestyle of the teenage tipplers". We have had 26 years of similar contrasting cuttings. The truth is, there is good news and bad news in the figures, and I never know why journalists would want to present only one side of the story."

Angela Balding, Survey Manager at the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
“Our latest 'Young People' report captures the attitudes of young people and, in particular, the changes seen from the primary to the secondary stage of pupils’ education. Despite the attention, drawn by some of the media, to extremes of young people’s behaviour, this report presents a more balanced view. For example, more 10-11 year old boys, than any of the other groups, continue to assess themselves as ‘very fit’ but perceived fitness, from youngsters aged 10-15 years, continues to decline both in boys and girls. However, since 1995 the numbers of 10-15 year olds, who have reported being ‘fit’ or ‘very fit’, has remained relatively stable.”

Dr David Regis, Research Manager of the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
"What's the point of this research? Well, we never set out to produce a picture of the country, and this isn't really what we have done. We do local research to tell schools and local authorities what the picture is like in their community. At the end of each year we have a big collection of local studies which we combine to give an overall detailed picture of young people in our communities. Some of the topics we report on here are also available from Government or other research, but many of the findings we report, we have not seen published elsewhere. We are always adapting our surveys around the country to keep up with local concerns, and also to include the latest thinking about why young people behave as they do."

Angela Balding, Survey Manager at the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
“This year we have continued to try and find links between some questions. For example, when asked about how many hours of sleep they had ‘last night’, the more sleep 14-15 year old girls get they are less likely to: ‘want to lose weight’; worry ‘a lot’; and ‘feel afraid of going to school due to bullying’ (see table below). Those working with young people should find evidence here of areas that need further work together with many examples of young peoples’ positive attitudes about healthy lifestyle choices. We also see links between wanting to lose weight and skipping meals – no surprise there, I guess, but it's maybe not the best way to try and lose weight. We also see differences in behaviour between boys and girls from different ethnic groups.”

Year 10 girls’ sleep patterns, weight loss, worrying and bullying:

Hours of sleep

Would like to lose weight

Worry ‘A lot’

Never afraid of going to school because of bullying

%

%

%

Up to 3 hrs

77

82

61

4-5 hrs

75

77

68

6-7 hrs

72

67

73

8-10 hrs

59

59

77

It is clear that, for 14-15 year old girls in this sample, the more sleep they get they are less likely to : want to lose weight, worry ‘a lot’ and feel afraid of going to school due to bullying.

Dr David Regis, Research Manager of the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
"Journalists often always ask me, 'what is new this year?'. As you might expect, this year's results are quite similar to last year's, and where they are not, it's not possible to tell from just one year's results whether a trend has started, finished or reversed. But in this year's report, we have added a sprinkle of charts showing trends, so you can see for yourself. We can see lots of good news about alcohol, drugs and tobacco (all long-term downward trends) and not such good news about skipping lunch (long-term upward trend). We also see trends in wider society reflected in our figures: there is a long-term trend downwards in the proportion of young people who live with both their mother and father."
"Many authorities work with us in alternate years (e.g., 2008-2010-2012), and there are some series of figures which show this regional bias. We particularly enjoyed the chart (below) for eating 'wholemeal bread on most days', which has been bouncing up and down around the figure of 25% for the last decade and more, showing it's a more popular food item in those authorities that work with us in odd-numbered years. I guess this shows, for charts where we don't see such bouncing, young people around the country may have quite similar levels of that behaviour."

"There's 2 year groups to get through, 6 classes each, so we need to book the IT suite for 12 slots, and it's already booked up, and the classes are 30 but the IT suite has just 25 computers, 24 of which work... Just send us a parcel of questionnaire booklets, and we can do it all in one morning!"

This report, Young People into 2013, is a "unique contemporary archive" of young people from the Schools Health Education Unit (SHEU). Each year, since 1977, SHEU carry out healthy lifestyle surveys with young people and, in 2012, this involved over 93,000 youngsters. This report contains over 100 health-related behaviour questions and answers from over 68,000 pupils between the ages of 10 and 15. They tell us about what they do at home, at school, and with their friends. The data have been collected from primary and secondary schools across the United Kingdom. The report is the 27th in the series.

Dr David Regis, Research Manager of the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
"Angels or Demons? When I first started working in the Unit in 1986, I saw two headlines about the first report. One declared, "Teenagers take homework and alcohol in moderation", while the other – looking at the same figures – summed it up as "Layabout lifestyle of the teenage tipplers". We have had 26 years of similar contrasting cuttings. The truth is, there is good news and bad news in the figures, and I never know why journalists would want to present only one side of the story."

Angela Balding, Survey Manager at the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
“Our latest 'Young People' report captures the attitudes of young people and, in particular, the changes seen from the primary to the secondary stage of pupils’ education. Despite the attention, drawn by some of the media, to extremes of young people’s behaviour, this report presents a more balanced view. For example, more 10-11 year old boys, than any of the other groups, continue to assess themselves as ‘very fit’ but perceived fitness, from youngsters aged 10-15 years, continues to decline both in boys and girls. However, since 1995 the numbers of 10-15 year olds, who have reported being ‘fit’ or ‘very fit’, has remained relatively stable.”

Dr David Regis, Research Manager of the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
"What's the point of this research? Well, we never set out to produce a picture of the country, and this isn't really what we have done. We do local research to tell schools and local authorities what the picture is like in their community. At the end of each year we have a big collection of local studies which we combine to give an overall detailed picture of young people in our communities. Some of the topics we report on here are also available from Government or other research, but many of the findings we report, we have not seen published elsewhere. We are always adapting our surveys around the country to keep up with local concerns, and also to include the latest thinking about why young people behave as they do."

Angela Balding, Survey Manager at the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
“This year we have continued to try and find links between some questions. For example, when asked about how many hours of sleep they had ‘last night’, the more sleep 14-15 year old girls get they are less likely to: ‘want to lose weight’; worry ‘a lot’; and ‘feel afraid of going to school due to bullying’ (see table below). Those working with young people should find evidence here of areas that need further work together with many examples of young peoples’ positive attitudes about healthy lifestyle choices. We also see links between wanting to lose weight and skipping meals – no surprise there, I guess, but it's maybe not the best way to try and lose weight. We also see differences in behaviour between boys and girls from different ethnic groups.”

Year 10 girls’ sleep patterns, weight loss, worrying and bullying:

Hours of sleep

Would like to lose weight

Worry ‘A lot’

Never afraid of going to school because of bullying

%

%

%

Up to 3 hrs

77

82

61

4-5 hrs

75

77

68

6-7 hrs

72

67

73

8-10 hrs

59

59

77

It is clear that, for 14-15 year old girls in this sample, the more sleep they get they are less likely to : want to lose weight, worry ‘a lot’ and feel afraid of going to school due to bullying.

Dr David Regis, Research Manager of the Schools Health Education Unit, says,
"Journalists often always ask me, 'what is new this year?'. As you might expect, this year's results are quite similar to last year's, and where they are not, it's not possible to tell from just one year's results whether a trend has started, finished or reversed. But in this year's report, we have added a sprinkle of charts showing trends, so you can see for yourself. We can see lots of good news about alcohol, drugs and tobacco (all long-term downward trends) and not such good news about skipping lunch (long-term upward trend). We also see trends in wider society reflected in our figures: there is a long-term trend downwards in the proportion of young people who live with both their mother and father."
"Many authorities work with us in alternate years (e.g., 2008-2010-2012), and there are some series of figures which show this regional bias. We particularly enjoyed the chart (below) for eating 'wholemeal bread on most days', which has been bouncing up and down around the figure of 25% for the last decade and more, showing it's a more popular food item in those authorities that work with us in odd-numbered years. I guess this shows, for charts where we don't see such bouncing, young people around the country may have quite similar levels of that behaviour."

The report, Young People into 2012, is a unique contemporary archive of young people from the Schools Health Education Unit. There are over 100 health-related behaviour questions and answers from over 31,000 youngsters between the ages of 10 and 15. They tell us about what they do at home, at school, and with their friends. The data have been collected from primary and secondary schools across the United Kingdom. The report is the 26th in the series.
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